At this month’s PandoMonthly in New York, Dixon, a partner at Andreessen-Horowitz, talked about the need for a diverse investment portfolio, and part of the thrill of working for such an influential venture capital firm is keeping tabs on what could be the next big thing. Dixon thinks it could be bitcoin.

He finds the crypto-based virtual currency fascinating, and not just because he has the bona fides of a hard core programmer. Bitcoin has the potential to be usable and feasible mainstream mode of payment — or in his words, a “payment mechanism.” While some may view it as “a crazy Libertarian thing,” Dixon sees it as a way to revolutionize online commerce. That is, a way to transact online payments without the usual fraud and security headaches.

Online payment systems in their current iterations are plagued by numerous maladies. Identity and verification being the biggest factors for online payment companies. “You go to a payment company, half of the staff is anti-fraud,” he says. “You talk to a commerce company… you have to block 40 countries in the world from buying stuff from there.”

Take Paypal for example. If you want to quickly pay your friend, you have to open account, verify your identity, add your payment info, etc. Bitcoin mitigates all these steps, and makes it easier to complete what should be unbelievably simple transactions. It’s like a preloaded Starbucks card that you can buy an increasing number of things with.

This raises questions about the currency’s long-term viability. This week, the Department of Homeland Security seized accounts of bitcoin exchange Mt Gox. But Dixon say the Mt Gox case is unique to that specific business, and probably doesn’t indict bitcoin as a whole. And when the mainstream press speaks of bitcoin as a crazy new currency, he sees the issue as mis-framed.

People who write about it in the New York Times, for instance, don’t “know what they’re talking about,” Dixon says.

[Disclosure: In addition to being a personal investor in PandoDaily, Dixon is a partner at Andreessen Horowitz, the partners of which Marc Andreessen and Jeff Jordan are also personal investors.]

Booker, which helps service businesses better engage with customers online, has raised $35 million in a Series C round led by Medina Capital, with participation from strategic investor First Data, Jump Capital, and Signal Peak Ventures, as well as existing investors. The New York City company now sees 3 million appointments booked monthly across 73 countries in 11 languages on its platform. [via Booker]

PCH, a company which “helps entrepreneurs turn ideas into brands and makes a variety of consumer tech products for major companies such as Apple,” has acquired Fab for a reported $15 million in cash and stock. Fab previously had a $1 billion valuation and raised $325 million. It will “continue to focus on design” at PCH. [Source: Bloomberg]

BlackBerry has unveiled several new smartphones at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, including the touchscreen-focused BlackBerry Leap and a device with a “dual curve slider,” in addition to its keyboard-equipped products. [Source: New York Times]

March 3, 2015

“I hope to have a bigger presence in the tech world. I love coming up with different app ideas, and I have a few more that are coming out. Once you get started and you have this creative bug of ideas that you want to get out, I feel like I’ve partnered with the right team, and now I have the creative outlet to make that happen. I’m happy that people are into it and perceiving it well. I just want to create more apps.”

PayPal is planning to acquire Paydiant, the company behind CurrentC — retailers’ answer to Apple Pay — for a reported $280 million. No word yet on how the companies will mix, nor if Paydiant’s relationship with the industry group behind CurrentC will remain intact. [Source: Re/code]

Microsoft is in talks to acquire Prismatic, a news aggregation service that uses natural language processing to recommend content in which its users might be interested, according to a report from TechCrunch. Apple, Yahoo, Google, and Facebook are all said to have expressed similar interest in the company. (Which is surely a sign of actual interest and not at all an attempt by someone at the company to make it seem like a hot commodity — right?) [Source: TechCrunch]

March 2, 2015

“Just wanted to confirm that the rumors are true — I’m excited to be running Google’s Photos and Streams products! It’s important to me that these changes are properly understood to be positive improvements to both our products and how they reach users.”